[Denvercoder9]

Another motivation behind the change seems to be to treat all countries equally. Previously, some countries (such as Norway and Sweden) with equal timezones since 1970, but differing timezones before 1970 got their own zone, while other countries in the same situation (such as Angola and Niger) shared a zone.

The controversial solution to this is that all places with equal timezones since 1970 have been merged to share a single zone with the pre-1970 history of the largest place in that zone (which might not be valid for the whole zone). There are backward-compatibility links provided so that the old zone names still work, and there was a pre-existing build option to include all known (but incomplete) pre-1970 data, which splits the zones again.

Opponents of that change argue that instead of consolidating currently-alike zones, every currently-existing country should get their own zone with the pre-1970 history of the largest place in that zone (which, again, might not be valid for the whole zone). To do this correctly would of course require someone to volunteer the pre-1970 data for zones that would be split, which notably no one seems to have done yet.

What's most remarkable to me as an outsider is about how incredible niche the usecase where this makes a difference is: you have to be interested in pre-1970 timestamps, but build tzdb without enabling the pre-1970 historic data.

[whoknowswhat11]

Some of the alternative proposals were (I think) to do time zones based on time zone authorities / to do timezones per country etc. So instead of merging countries that share the same timezones you would add entries? I will say it was hard to follow.

But yes, Paul seems to be clear that it will be prohibited to use the older time zone database for diversity and inclusion reasons. So it does seem to be driven by that to a degree.

[Denvercoder9]

> Paul seems to be clear that it will be prohibited to use the older time zone database for diversity and inclusion reasons.

This is utter and complete nonsense. He said the old database was incompatible with diversity and equity values, but he never once said anyone would be prohibited from using it.